For Israelis, the overriding message is that their government will go to extraordinary lengths to bring the country’s soldiers back home. This is critical to maintaining the morale of an army manned by conscripts and reservists drawn from most segments of the nation’s population, other than Arab Israelis. It is even more essential if the army is to remain one of the few venerated institutions in Israeli society.

Nonetheless, for a prime minister who wrote a book arguing for an uncompromising approach to terrorism, this is a heavy price to pay. It signals that Israel will indeed negotiate, albeit under duress, for hostages and with an organization that most of the world regards as terrorists.

by Robert Danin, I have to wonder why this deal was not made earlier. Deals for the release of Shalit have fallen through in the past, but from all accounts, Netanyahu has agreed to release some high level prisoners that previous governments had refused to consider. Of course, there is a considerable amount of pressure on the Israeli Prime Minister from the families of those killed in Palestinian attacks not to negotiate with Hamas and this has played a major role in the delay of a deal (along with Netanyahu’s book that Danin mentions.) Moreover, perhaps negotiations were put on hold as the Egyptian moderating team was undoubtedly focused on domestic matters for most of the year, but why not last year or the year before?

Presumably, Hamas has been pushing for a deal – Shalit is only valuable for the group in a prisoner exchange (albeit he is a symbol of the resistance). Why did the Israeli government decide to back down on some of the names demanded by Hamas now?

In related news, Israel has decided to apologize to Egypt for the deaths of six Egyptian policemen, killed by Israeli soldiers in the Sinai earlier this year. Obviously, this is quite different than Israel’s refusal to apologize for the death of nine Turkish activists on the Mavi Marmara – a refusal that directly led to the deterioration of relations between the two countries. Both Egypt and Turkey are strategically important for Israel, yet Israel only apologizes to one. There were reports that Netanyahu was about to apologize, but held back after coming under pressure from the foreign minister.

Both of these moves signify minor, yet important shifts in Israeli policy, but does this mean anything? Does it show an Israeli government that is belatedly reacting to its own self-isolation? Or is there something bigger afoot?

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2 thoughts on “Minor Thoughts on the Shalit Deal”

Interesting. Seems like some in the Israeli government realize they’re going to need other allies besides the US. This past year has been a disaster for Irsaeli diplomacy and I think their own hubris was the cause.

International Criminal Law

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All of the sudden Israel became a source of inspiration and a leading factor in American Jewish life. Often it was heralded as the “light unto nations” and various narratives at this time sprang up with great proliferation. Criticism of Israel and its policies within the community and within the world in general was kept hidden to a point that criticism was (and still now) considered anti-Semitic or “self hating.” This newly found love affair produced a plethora of “authoritative” works by prominent American Jews and their sympathizers that were held in high regard. Miraculously these books coincided with key events in the history where Israel was rightly being condemned for massive atrocities in the occupied territories and foreign countries such as Lebanon.